Despair
by Kelly6
Summary: Chloe loses the will to live. Can anyone help her? (chlex eventually)
1. Chapter One

Despair  
  
Author's Note: This story switches between points of view. There were things that needed to be said that I felt could be stated better if said like that. Please tell me what you think; I really want your opinion.  
  
Just a warning, this one's a dark one.  
  
Rating: PG-13, just for good measure  
  
Disclaimer: None of it's mine, other than the storyline. Duh. The lyrics are from the song "My Last Breath" by Evanescence; they also aren't mine.  
  
Description: Chloe loses the will to live. Could she be helped?  
  
****  
  
There are times when I wish I had never been born. Those times have appeared more and more frequently lately. I think, 'If only I hadn't been conceived.' Then my father wouldn't have to deal with me and who knows? He might still be with my "mother" (I use this term loosely. She bore me, but that's about the extent of her mothering career.) And then they both would be happy. God knows, Clark would be happier. He'd have nothing getting in between him and his Precious Lana, nothing keeping them from dating, getting married, settling down in a house with a picket fence and having 2.5 children. He would also never have had a nosy reporter, poking into a past he apparently didn't want revealed.  
  
I don't really have any friends, save Pete and Clark. And Clark was constantly leaving me or making up excuses and lately, Pete had joined the club, thereby leaving me alone. There was Lana, but you couldn't discuss anything with her. She always managed to turn the conversation back to herself. She didn't care how you were feeling; she just went through the motions to be polite. "How are you?" She'd ask, looking like she actually cared.  
  
"Horrible I-" You'd begin, but before you even complete the sentence you'd be interrupted by her.  
  
"Oh my gosh! Did you hear what happened to me yesterday?" And then she'd ramble on and on, and always about something stupid, and you'd be forced to listen. You can't not listen. I have found this little lesson out the hard way. Once, I had interrupted Lana while she was telling one of her meaningless stories and she had stormed away in tears. "You NEVER listen!" She had exclaimed.  
  
Chloe had nothing to live for. And maybe she couldn't wipe her existence completely away, but she could do the next best thing.  
  
Hold on to me love  
  
You know I can't stay long  
  
All I wanted was to say I love you and I'm not afraid  
  
Can you hear me?  
  
Can you feel me in your arms?  
  
Holding my last breath  
  
Safe inside myself  
  
Are all my thoughts of you  
  
Sweet raptured light  
  
It ends here tonight  
  
I'll miss the winter  
  
A world of fragile things  
  
Look for me in the white forest  
  
Hiding in a hollow tree (come find me)  
  
I know you hear me  
  
I can taste it in your tears  
  
Holding my last breath  
  
Safe inside myself  
  
Are all my thoughts of you  
  
Sweet raptured light  
  
It ends here tonight  
  
Closing your eyes to disappear  
  
You pray your dreams will leave you here  
  
But still you wake and know the truth  
  
No one's there  
  
Say goodnight  
  
Don't be afraid  
  
Calling me, calling me, as you fade to black  
  
Nobody will miss me, she rationalized to herself. She sat down in the steaming tub and reached blindly for the knife. 'Just one cut. Just one cut.' She repeated that over and over as a kind of a mantra. 'One cut and it's all over. Just one cut.' She inhaled deeply and slashed violently at her wrist with the blade. It seemed to do the trick. Blood came pouring out her arm and she began to feel weak. The water that filled the tub had turned a sickening shade of red. She leaned back, no longer strong enough to support herself, and shut her eyes. (Just one cut.) And then there was nothing; sweet, blissful nothing.  
  
TBC. 


	2. Chapter Two

Despair *Chapter Two*  
  
A/N: I'll keep that in mind, Blaire, and thanks for the carrot. *licks lips* Mmmm. delicious. BTW, This isn't the greatest chapter, but deal with it. It was one in the morning and I was tired.  
  
*****  
  
Lex sauntered into the Sullivan's living room. It was the middle of the day, so he wasn't expecting anybody to be there. He had simply come to pick up some reports that Gabe had left for him, nothing else. 'Yeah, right.' His mind objected as Lex sneaked a peek at the room of his plant manager's daughter.  
  
He placed the key to the house on the kitchen counter, planning on returning it to its home under the welcome mat on the front porch once he found those reports he had needed. Gabe had been on his way to a very important business trip when Lex had asked him about them.  
  
*  
  
"Fuck." Gabe had replied, ever so eloquently, to Lex's inquiry. "Do you need them right now?" Gabe questioned, "Or can you wait until after the meeting?"  
  
"Right now would be better." Replied Lex. Moments later, he had come up with a solution to their little problem. "Why don't I just swing by your house and get them? It'd be easier for both of us." (There is a reason he has a genius IQ, folks.)  
  
*  
  
Gabe had responded with an enthusiastic yes and told Lex everything he'd need to know; where he could find the key, where the reports would be.  
  
He searched the kitchen counters up and down but was still unable to find the specific documents he was looking for. He was about to expand his search to the living room when he heard a large, metallic clank come from upstairs.  
  
The first thought that entered his mind was that there must be burglars in the house and before he even realized what he was doing, he was up the stairs and trying to figure out where the noise had come from. He settled on the door directly in front of him. He opened it and walked inside, preparing to attack whoever it was that was up here. His face flushed a deep pink when he saw Chloe in the bath tub. He hastily made his exit, apologizing to her the whole way.  
  
Then, something hit him. The color of the water in the tub was off. Something was definitely wrong here. He walked back inside and stifled the urge to vomit. Chloe was sitting in a tub of what appeared to be own blood; the water was sickeningly red. His eyes fell on the knife on the floor. It had been that that had made the sound that drew him up here. He thanked whatever higher power that was up there for small miracles and kneeled to check her pulse. It was there, it was just very weak.  
  
He pulled her out of the tub and -ever the gentleman- wrapped a towel around her naked form. He ripped the sleeves off of his shirt and used them as makeshift tourniquets; anything to stop the bleeding. Lex then pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and called the police. He gave them all the basic information; he was at 65 Riverview Road, there was a 17 year old girl here who had attempted to commit suicide, she had slashed her wrists and her pulse was weak, they need to send an ambulance over here quickly.  
  
As he waited for the ambulance to come, Lex did his best to rouse Chloe. He talked to her, told her words of encouragement -she was going to be okay, he would see to that, he promised- and checked continuously for a pulse.  
  
Finally, after what had seemed like forever but was in reality closer to a minute and a half, the paramedics arrived. They pushed Lex out of the way and did their routine for these types of calls. Lex could do nothing but watch helplessly and hope she'd be okay.  
  
They loaded her into the back and were about to close the door when Lex climbed right inside -he hadn't bothered asking permission, there was no way in hell they were going to keep him from coming along.  
  
He stood beside her and noticed how fragile she looked, like at any moment she could break. Her normally rosy cheeks were a ghostly white and her eyes -on the rare occasion when they fluttered open looked vacuous and unlike the vibrant, excited ones he had began to connect with Chloe.  
  
Lex closed his hand around Chloe's as the ambulance sped towards the hospital, praying to God it wasn't too late.  
  
*****  
  
A/N: Evil, aren't I? I swear that by next update you'll know if she lives or not. Just so you know, reviews make me write and post faster. (Just a helpful suggestion.) 


	3. Chapter Three

Despair *Chapter Three*  
  
A/N: *snickers* I know that it was wicked of me to leave it there but I just couldn't help myself. Serves you all right for doing the very same thing to me so many times. Cliffhangers are evil, aren't they?  
  
Anyway, read on to find out how Chloe's doing.  
  
******  
  
It had been over an hour since their ambulance ride and still no word of Chloe's condition had reached Lex. He was pacing up and down the halls of the hospital, occasionally trying to bribe the information out of the nurses that kept flying in and out of the room Chloe was in.  
  
Finally, the doctor came out of the room, looking seriously at Lex. 'Oh God.' Lex thought to himself, noting the somber look on the doctor's face, 'She didn't make it.' He felt tears begin to well up in his eyes and was about to go somewhere not so public to let them flow when the doctor informed him that Chloe was finally in stable condition. Lex let the sigh of relief whoosh right out of him and the tears were disappearing. 'She's okay.' He told himself, 'She's okay.'  
  
The doctor continued by telling him that she had lost a lot of blood, but they were able to stop the bleeding and get some more blood back into her. Also, she would most likely still not wake up until the next day at the earliest. She was weak from the blood loss, so even when she did wake up she probably wouldn't be up for visitors. However, Mr. Luthor was allowed to spend as much time as he needed in her room.  
  
Lex smirked a little at that last statement -all his worry and anxiety about Chloe now gone- apparently this doctor knew who he was and was going out of his way to make him happy. He walked into Chloe's room and sat down on one of the uncomfortable yellow chairs lining the wall. This was going to be a long night.  
  
******  
  
She opened her eyes, startled by the light that came flooding in; she shut them quickly, wincing in pain. Where was she? What was she doing here? And most importantly, why was she still alive?  
  
She glanced around the room and surveyed that she was in the hospital. She noticed Lex staring at her intently looking like he hadn't gotten all that much sleep. "You look like crap." She observed.  
  
"Well, you would too if you had spent the whole night in one of these chairs." He commented wryly. Then, his face fell serious. "Why the hell did you do that, Chloe? You scared the crap out of me. You're just lucky I had been there. I could only imagine if your father had found you." He trailed off as both pictured what Gabe's reaction to finding his only daughter would have been. "He would have been too late to help you." He remarked quietly.  
  
"You're the one that found me?" She asked.  
  
He didn't bother answering her question; it was more rhetorical than anything else. "Why'd you do it?" He asked her.  
  
She looked up at him, her large hazel eyes brimming with tears and filled so completely with a sadness that ripped Lex's heart out because he understood it all too well. "I didn't want to live." She answered him truthfully. When he didn't comment, she elaborated. "It wasn't worth it anymore. Every day I'd wake up dreading the day before me, wanting nothing more than to curl up into a little ball and sleep forever. I would fall asleep, wishing to never wake back up because waking up meant I'd be forced to spend another day watching everyone else be happy while I wasn't. Anyway, it wasn't like I'd be missed."  
  
Lex winced at her words. How could she possibly think that? "What about your father? You can't say he wouldn't miss you."  
  
"I know he would, but I can't help but feel like I've never been anything but trouble to him. If I had never been born then, chances are, my mother would have never left him, he wouldn't have had to deal with the stress of raising a daughter all by himself -let alone a teenage one that tends to be a magnet for trouble and meteor freaks, and he'd be happier."  
  
"You're an extremely bright young woman. You know as well as I do that, had you died, you would have killed your father right along with you. And you know full well that nothing makes him happier than you do; nothing. So quit talking that way.  
  
Speaking of your father," He continued, "He is still not aware of this. He is currently in a meeting with one of the top executives at JaniCorp and is not answering his cell phone."  
  
Chloe blanched when she thought of how her father would react. "You can't tell him." She told him strongly. "He can't know. It'll kill him if he knew."  
  
Lex knew that what he was about to do was completely immoral and Gabe would be all kinds of mad if he found out, but it was the best solution he could come up with. "We'll make a deal. I don't tell your father, but only on one condition. You have to call me everyday and visit the mansion at least once weekly. I don't want you to pull any more stunts like this. Are we agreed?"  
  
She considered the offer for a moment before sticking out her hand for him to shake and agreeing, "Deal."  
  
*****  
  
A/N: It's a little short and I'm not sure if it came out exactly how I wanted to but, oh well. Please give me feedback, it's the only way that I know that someone out there actually cares about this fic. If I don't get that many replies for this, I'll most likely stop working on it for the time being and move on to another fic. So again I beg, review!! 


	4. Chapter Four

Despair *Chapter Four*  
  
A/N: Sorry about the length, but that was the best I could do. Also, it flips between POV's and times so I'm not sure how confusing it might be. If you have any problems, just tell me and I'll be sure to edit it. I'm not really too pleased with this chapter, so if you have any suggestions to improve it, they'll be much appreciated.  
  
Please tell me what you think of it, I really want to know what your opinions are.  
  
*****  
  
"Just out of curiosity, Miss Sullivan, how come you didn't leave a note?" It was the Saturday after Lex had found Chloe. She had been staying true to her word and calling every night. At first, Lex thought the calls would be stiff and uncomfortable, but he now found himself looking forward to them. The topics of conversation ranged so greatly and they were always sure to be interesting. This was Chloe's first visit to the mansion.  
  
"If you hate the world enough to forcibly remove yourself from it, why would you want to say goodbye to it?" She said, as an explanation. "Let's say you're on the phone with someone and they really piss you off. You don't say an eloquent and well thought out good bye before slamming that phone back on the hook, you simply hang up." Once she finished she stretched herself out on the black leather couch in Lex's library. Lex was sitting across from her on a leather couch of his own. He seemed pretty comfortable in her presence also, in his own Luthor way.  
  
Lex considered her reply for a moment before responding, "I suppose that makes sense." He said. "Although, personally, I would have gone for a long note listing all the things I had been to afraid to say in life, all the insults and pent up anger and frustration I had kept inside of me all that time. Who knows, by the time I had finished writing it I probably would have felt a lot better."  
  
Chloe smiled a little at his statement and Lex couldn't believe that she was the same girl who had tried to kill herself only days before. This girl seemed just as happy as any other. Could she have realized how much life was worth living already?  
  
Chloe stretched herself out on the couch, wondering how a man as smart as Lex could be so easy to fool.  
  
***  
  
As she approached the large oak doors that led into Lex's mansion, Chloe slipped her mask on; she looked completely happy and content with the world, like a normal girl her age. It had become easier and easier to slip that mask on with each coming day, and that had scared her to no end.  
  
She had become so good at hiding her emotions that no one, not even her father, was able to see through her façade. At first she was thankful that no one could tell, but as time wore on, she began to become more and more unhappy and began to think that because no one noticed, it meant that no one cared.  
  
***  
  
Lex glanced down at his watch, it was 7:00. Chloe would be here any minute. This was going to be her second visit to the mansion and Lex found that he couldn't wait to see her again. He really enjoyed her company and he was amazed at the progress she had made, she seemed totally happy again. It seemed all she needed was to know that someone cared.  
  
Lex figured that he might as well do something useful while he waited. He stuck his head into the doorway of his office, "Any new messages?" He asked his secretary Rebecca. She looked up at him and then back down at desk before replying, "Um, yeah. Miss Sullivan left one for you." Lex looked at her expectantly and then, blushing she continued, "Oh, sorry, here." She thrust a slip of paper at him.  
  
He quickly unfolded the paper, wondering what it could be about. When he read the note, he gasped and dropped it to the ground, breaking into a run for his car.  
  
I'm sorry, Lex. I suppose I'm not as strong as you thought.  
  
Chloe  
  
*** 


	5. Chapter Five

Despair *Chapter Five*  
  
A/N: Thank you everyone for your lovely reviews, without them, I'm sure I would have given up on this already. As is the custom, I beg you to review. It only takes about a minute or so of your time and it lets me know that there are people out there reading this.  
  
This one's for Jules. You said 'Pwease'. How could I refuse? (Now about that cake...*g*)  
  
It's also for Kathy. Thanks for pestering me... I mean *requesting* for more. *g*  
  
*Holds up drink* Here's to hoping this lives up to your expectations. *Takes a swig* And this is in case it doesn't. ;)  
  
*****  
  
Lex sped down the winding road, mentally cursing himself for being so stupid, for falling for her little act. His hands were shaking on the wheel and the one thought that filled his mind was 'What if I'm too late?'. It had been pure dumb luck that led him to her last time and Lex couldn't help but wonder what would happen if his luck had run out.  
  
He forced the images of Chloe, sprawled dead on the floor, from his mind as he rushed from his vehicle, not even bothering to close the door as he sprinted up to the porch. He tried the door and, as he had suspected, found it locked. In seconds, he was on his hands and knees, frantically throwing the welcome mat behind him and searching for the key. He found it, scrambled to get up and swung the door open as quickly as possible.  
  
When she heard the sound of the door being flung open, Chloe looked up and directly into the eyes of Lex Luthor. She swayed slightly as the pills had begun to take effect and Lex's glance fell upon the bottle on the counter in front of her. "Impeccable timing as always, Mr. Luthor." She remarked, a slur in her words and a slight smirk crossing her face, before she fell to the floor, losing consciousness.  
  
In seconds, he had crossed the room and had her in his arms. Before making his way out the door, Lex hurriedly grabbed the little orange container and stuffed it into the pocket of his jacket. He lay her gently down in the back seat of his car before screeching out of the driveway, speeding towards the hospital.  
  
***  
  
Someone gently shaking his shoulders brought Lex back to consciousness. He looked up and into the soft, kindly face of the doctor. "I'm sorry, Mr. Luthor," He said quietly, "But she didn't make it. You were too late." And with three simple sentences, all of his worst fears were confirmed and his world collapsed around him. He had failed her.  
  
Lex's eyes shot open and he was jarred back to reality. Sweat was pouring off him and his heart was pounding so loudly and quickly he could hear it in his ears. He saw the doctor approaching and braced himself, preparing for the worst and praying that the dream hadn't been an omen of things to come. "She's all right." Lex felt a sigh of relief whoosh out of him at the doctor's gentle words. "You got her here just in time. We pumped her stomach and got everything out. You can talk to her now."  
  
Lex headed towards her room, feeling considerably better now that she was no longer in any immediate danger.  
  
***  
  
"What kind of idiot are you?!" Lex was irate, eyes flashing, arms waving. He saw the man inch warily away from him, clutching a paper tightly in his hand. "Two seconds in a room with her is enough to prescribe anti-depressants?! What kind of school did you go to?"  
  
The balding man had the impudence to look indignant at his remark and spat "Harv-" out hotly before Lex fixed him with a cold glare that stopped the word dead in its tracks.  
  
"I suggest you leave." Lex stated and something in his tone told the man that it wasn't so much a suggestion as a demand. The doctor, noting the threat the words held, left the room with a quick nod.  
  
Lex had walked into the room to find the doctor handing Chloe what looked like a prescription. He knew that the man couldn't have been there long enough to correctly diagnose anything because Chloe had only woken up five minutes before. He had immediately launched into a tirade about it, there was no way he would let them drug Chloe up like that.  
  
He heard the door click shut softly and Chloe was the first to speak. "Lex Luthor, my savior." She remarked dryly. "That makes two times now. You're really getting good at this. But I must say, the whole hero thing is really more Clark's forte."  
  
"Two attempts and still no success," Lex observed calmly, "While my hero skills may be improving, you don't seem to be getting any better at this. Perhaps you should pick up a new hobby." A quirk of his lips was the only hint that he was trying to get a rise out of her.  
  
But Chloe refused to let him provoke the response he wanted. "Have you ever known me to be a quitter, Lex?" She questioned, her voice and features eerily calm. Lex had to suppress a shudder, not only at the impassive quality her face had adapted, but at the determined glint in her eye.  
  
"It's not quitting; it's called admitting defeat and moving on." He looked into her eyes, before speaking again, this time without any trace of humor. "You promised you wouldn't try that again." Lex said quietly, "You lied to me." His voice was tinged with hurt and, for some reason, that annoyed Chloe to no end.  
  
"Why'd you have to find me again? Why couldn't you have just let me die?" She snapped.  
  
"I thought you weren't a quitter." Came his quiet reply.  
  
"I'm not quitting, Lex; I'm admitting defeat."  
  
**** 


End file.
